Fusenews: Eat Delicious Lead

Magazine cartoonist Mike Lynch recently put up some high-res scans of a Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs as penned by a Mr. Art Seiden. Some nice mid-50s images to be found here, if you’ve a yen for that kind of thing. I just like the expression on Snow White’s face on the cover. She’s not casually skipping through the picturesque woods. She is friggin’ booking it for her life, and these doggone little men keep getting in her way. Thanks to Drawn for the link.

There’s a new Edge of the Forest out for March/April. For those of you unaware of the online serial, it’s a blogger run look at kidlit in a bi-monthly format. Very cool stuff is always to be found there.

I’m not much of an anime fan myself, but this was intriguing. Walter Minkel at The Monkey Speaks managed to locate something called The Library War. Says the site, "The action comedy anime adapts Hiro Arikawa’s popular novel about battles fought to preserve libraries when a new law threatens to clamp down on freedom of expression in 2019." Sounds about right to me.

As Kelly Herold said herself when she posted a link to this, this isn’t strictly children’s literature. Still, it’s pretty exciting getting to look at some of the panels from his upcoming graphic novel A People’s History of American Empire. The panels look a little out of order, but this will clearly be a book to watch out for. You can see a YouTube video narrated by Viggo Mortensen, using panels from the title. Thanks toBig A little afor the link.

The Witches – Wait . . . what? They’re doing another one? Probably a good idea since the last one had a tacked on happy ended that always bugged me. So who’s gonna direct. . . . oh, you have GOT to be kidding me! Del Toro? Guillermo Del Toro? Mr. Pan’s Labyrinth Del Toro? Right-o. New plan. You go and see that movie and meanwhile I will lie quivering under my bedsheets until it all goes away.

No one writes this sort of thing without knowing perfectly well that people are going to complain. Yes, this week The Telegraph produced a list of 110 books: The perfect library. At least there even is a children’s book section. It consists of: Swallows and Amazons by Arthur Ransome (the Famous Five are very big these days),The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe by C.S. Lewis, The Lord of the Rings by J.R. R. Tolkien, His Dark Materials by Philip Pullman, Babar by Jean de Brunhoff (the only out-and-out picture book), The Railway Children by E. Nesbit, Winnie-the-Pooh by A.A. Milne, Harry Potter by J.K. Rowling, The Wind in the Willows by Kenneth Grahame, and Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson. I’m sure they felt very daring with Rowling and Pullman. Not a very exciting list, in the end. Thanks to Bookninja for the link.

Drop Everything and Read Day is nigh. D.E.A.R., a day in honor of Beverly Cleary, is going to be on April 12th, apparently. For those of you in New York, here’s the skinny on celebrating in that big green thing that takes up so much retail space in the center of our island. Say they the, "’Drop Everything and Read’ Central Park Challenge will be held on Saturday, April 12, from 8AM-6PM, in Central Park’s ‘Norman’s Landscape’, along Central Park West, between 86th and 90th St. (take the A, C, B, D Train to 86th St. station). With crowds up to 10-20,000 expected throughout the day, adults, children and families are encouraged to bring a book, a blanket and a snack to ‘Drop Everything and Read!’" (Norman’s Landscape?) Knicks center Randolph Morris, former NBA All-Star John Starks and former WNBA All-Star, and New York Liberty center Kym Hampton will all be there. I don’t know who any of those people are myself, but if you do maybe you’ll be interested.

The world was stunned on Sunday when The New York Times announced that bloggers don’t live forever. Time to move to Plan B: Cryogenically freeze head. I’ll be in the kitchen if you need me.

Elizabeth Bird is currently New York Public Library's Youth Materials Collections Specialist. She has served on Newbery, written for Horn Book, and has done other lovely little things that she'd love to tell you about but that she's sure you'd find more interesting to hear of in person. Her opinions are her own and do not reflect those of NYPL, SLJ, or any of the other acronyms you might be able to name. Follow her on Twitter: @fuseeight.

Comments

Regarding HarperCollins: In some ways I agree. How many picture books are read in 10 minutes then returned, which causes a minus reflected on some author/illustrator’s royalty statement. The blame is assigned to the author-illustrator for being a loser. Harper is a big printer of celebrity books, foolish, since most celebrities do not even write their own books. And for the most part the books are bad and worse it’s a scam to the public. Then the “line” given to the REAL writers is that these celebrity books help to afford the publishing of the lowly craftsperson who actually knows how to write and paint. My friend was offered a book to paint by some celebrity and was given one month to paint a 32 page book due to the lack of planning by some over worked art director. My friend poo-poo’d the whole thing since the celeb was a buddy to the current US pResident. Smart friend. Honest friend, not bought and sold by false gold. If the publishers are having a hard time with money then it’s a good time to reflect on the bottom line thinking they put out long ago and long past due for blowback.

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About A Fuse #8 Production

Features everything from librarian previews of upcoming children's books to news, reviews, and videos. If it has something to do with children's literature, it will rate a mention here.

Betsy Bird is the Youth Materials Specialist of New York Public Library. She's reviewed for The New York Times and Kirkus, writes articles for Horn Book and SLJ, and wrote the picture book Giant Dance Party. You can contact her at Fusenumber8@gmail.com or follow her on . . .